Fic: Snow in July 3/4
Title Snow in July 3/4
Fandom X-Men First Class
Pairings Charles/Erik, past Erik/Magda
Beta speak_me_fair
World count of chapter 5581
Word count of entire fic 20 896
Rating/warnings PG.
Disclaimer Marvels owns it, not I.
Summary With no recollection of why he has ordered the Brotherhood to go deep into Russia during the winter months, Magneto is considered insane by his followers, but the unexplained presence of Charles Xavier leads Erik to think that there is something more than mad to his amnesia and to the haunting but impossible memory of a kiss in the snow...
Summary My contribution to the xmenreversebang. Artist was cmajalis, with art prompt 1066.
Erik stared at Frost, wondering if he had heard her right. The words did not seem to make sense to him. How could his mind have been taken away from him?
‘I don’t understand,’ he said finally. Frost laughed, delighted.
‘How can you be so slow? So stupid? He’s been manipulating you.’
‘No,’ he said under his breath. ‘Charles wouldn’t do that.’
‘Oh, yes, he would. You know that,’ she snorted. ‘He’s not some kind of saint. He entered your mind and he cut a chunk out of it. That’s where the headaches comes from.’
For the first time since she entered his room, Erik felt he dared to turn her his back. He made his way to the armchair, not even minding that it showed that what she was saying was making him feel unsteady. Frost did not seem to mind; instead, she just continued speaking, as she leaned against a set of drawers.
‘What confuses me is that you must have been stupid enough to take off your helmet in his presence,’ she said. ‘Probably it wasn’t very long either. He did a sloppy job. That false memory makes it screamingly obvious what he’s done.’
‘A false memory?’ Erik repeated. ‘The walk in the snow?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I guess it’s a little daydream of his that he decided to use, and you wanted it to be true badly enough that you accepted it as a real memory.’
‘But it doesn’t make sense,’ Erik concluded. I should have known - it was obvious. Why did I never think that it might be his doing?
‘It was just your wish for it to be real that blinded you.’
‘But why would he do that? What did he take?’ The idea made him feel cold inside. He had trusted Charles - he had even wanted him to reach into his mind, as that in itself would have been a sign that he could communicate - but instead he had cut into his thoughts and taken his memories. For all he knew, there were things which had happened in his life that he could no longer remember. ‘How far back did he go?’
‘Only the past weeks,’ Frost said. ‘You can remember Paris, can’t you?’
‘Vaguely.’
‘But not deciding to come here,’ she surmised. Erik shook his head. ‘I suspected that something was wrong as soon as you made the decision. In the middle of the night, waking everyone with your raving... It seemed like someone had interfered somehow. I think, though, that he simply communicated with you. You weren’t being controlled.’
‘What did he take?’ Erik asked. ‘Why are we here?’
‘I have no idea,’ she admitted. ‘The memories are gone, Magneto. The only one who knows might be dying for all we know.’ Erik sighed.
‘Then perhaps we should leave,’ he said. ‘There is no reason to linger here, if we don’t know what we are doing here.’ Frost scoffed.
‘It is not like you to give up,’ she said and approached. She stopped right in front of him, looking down at him with kohled eyes. ‘Besides, you know enough to figure it out.’
‘I don’t,’ he said. ‘I know nothing.’ Frost threw up her hands in exasperation.
‘He spoke to you, didn’t he?’
‘Yes...’
‘What did he say?’ Erik thought about it.
‘He spoke about children,’ he said. ‘He told me to find the children, before the others did.’ He thought about it for a moment, and then shook his head. ‘He was probably being delirious. His fever...’
‘No, he was making sense,’ Frost said, obviously sure of it. ‘Let me give you another piece of the puzzle. That village doctor you brought was suspicious of us, and he wondered whether we were the ones the soldiers were looking for.’ Erik looked up in surprise.
‘The soldiers?’ He thought about the village, with its empty streets and twitching curtains. He thought about the gypsy camp, deserted and burned. He thought of what Charles had said - “you must find them, before the others do.” ‘That was what Charles meant...’
‘And the reason why we’re here,’ Frost said.
‘For the children?’ Erik repeated. ‘What children?’ But even as he said it, he realised that they must have been children of the gypsies. ‘What would the army want with them?’ Frost sighed and sat down on the bed.
‘What do you know about that helmet of yours?’ she asked.
‘It was Shaw’s...’
‘Where did he get it from?’
‘I always assumed that he constructed it.’ Frost shook her head slowly, her smile bordering on condescending.
‘It was a gift,’ she explained, ‘from the Russians, to keep Xavier out of his head.’ Erik frowned.
‘The Russians have the technology to do that?’
‘Obviously they do,’ she said. ‘They also have the knowledge of telepaths to do it. The CIA took an interest in mutants. Is it really surprising if the KGB doesn’t also?’ Erik thought about it, and sighed.
‘No, it’s not.’ Briefly, he thought about Schmidt, and wondered to what end the SS would have wanted to use his mutant powers. Then he returned to the matter at hand, unwilling to dwell on the past. ‘So there were some mutant children among the gypsies. The state wanted them, for whatever reason. They destroyed the camp and drove everyone away...’ But the villagers seemed afraid that they would be back. ‘But they did not find the children.’ It was not impossible that someone in the village was hoarding them or at least helping them, but he thought it implausible. How the children would survive on their own in this cold, however, was difficult to imagine. ‘Are they still searching?’
‘From what I gathered from the doctor’s mind, yes,’ Frost said. Then she pointed out: ‘You’re still missing something.’
‘Why don’t you just tell me?’ Erik snapped. ‘I don’t want to play this game.’
‘It wouldn’t be as fun. What did Xavier say about the children?’ Erik strained his memory. He had thought at first that he had meant his own students, but he had refuted it.
‘“Not mine”,’ he said. ‘That was what he said.’ Frost watched him, evidently interested to see if he understood it. ‘I don’t understand. What of it?’ She smirked.
‘Your love is blinding you,’ she said. ‘Even after all this time, you’re so infatuated with your telepath friend that you don’t want to think of other loves.’ She edged closer and looked him in the eye. ‘“Not mine”, he said. What’s the opposite?’ He stared back at her defiantly. There was no direct opposite. His, hers, theirs...
‘Yours,’ he said. Saying it made him feel oddly numb, while his heart suddenly beat harder. It could not be, it must not be... ‘Magda.’
‘How many years ago were you with her, Magneto?’ she asked. ‘Thirteen? So the children would be old enough to have their powers...’
‘Children!’ he exclaimed. ‘That makes no sense - we were not together for that long....’
‘But enough for her to become pregnant,’ Frost said. ‘What is to say that she did not have twins?’ He shook his head. It could not be... ‘Think about it, Magneto! Why would Xavier call you? Surely not to run his errands for him - not just because he wanted an excuse to see you? He had found something that was so close to you that he felt he needed to tell you.’
Erik turned away. He wished Frost would leave him to his thoughts.
‘But why would he make me forget?’
‘Why were you both unconscious in that clearing?’ Frost retorted. ‘Perhaps you were attacked. Maybe he was worried that you would not keep your peace... or that you would put yourself in danger.’ She shifted a little and then admitted: ‘I don’t think he did it out of spite. He had a reason. From what I’ve gathered, he is one for high morals.’
Erik got up. It was all too much to take in. But no, he could not let it overwhelm him. If it did, it would paralyse him completely.
‘The children must be somewhere in the area,’ he said, looking out of the window. They must be hungry and cold, if they were still alive. ‘We must find them.’
Frost rolled her eyes.
‘Most likely, they’re already dead,’ she pointed out. ‘In this kind of cold, you can freeze to death within hours. They must have been outside for a week. Even if they’re hiding inside...’
‘We’re going to find them,’ Erik said through gritted teeth. He knew that Frost might be right, but it did not change anything. The thought of the small bodies of children left outside to become the prey of animals awoke an anger in him which he thought he had lost during this past week. His mother and his father - his entire family - had been left in unmarked graves. He would not want the same for his children.
Without a word, he left the room and headed towards his own. Frost followed him. He decided to ignore her, and instead started putting on his furs.
‘And if we find them alive, what do we do with them?’ she asked.
‘They’re mutants. Their place is with their own kind.’
‘The Brotherhood is no place for children, Magneto.’
Erik paused. In that respect she was right. Finally, he answered:
‘We send them to Charles’ school.’ He just hoped that Charles would live to take care of them.
***
When they stepped outside, it had finally stopped snowing. The snow still lay high, reaching over Erik’s knees. He had sent Riptide and Mystique in one direction and had taken Frost with him in the other. Behind him, she was muttering at how her trousers were being ruined by the wet. In any other circumstances, that would have put him in a better mood. Now, it was simply dead noise which disturbed the silence. He needed her telepathy, but he was not happy about having to bring her with him. He wished he could be alone now and think through what he had learned without having a telepath close by. The realisation that he was a father had left him numb. It felt like a crude joke. What he had shared with Magda felt like it could not lead to such a thing. It had been passionate but brief, and before he had introduced the question of marriage he had shown her his power and she had turned away in horror. He knew that in reality, all it had taken was a moment, and that was a moment they had indeed shared. It was only about genetic tissue - he had given them no paternal protection or parental love. He was their sire, not their father.
‘Can you sense anything?’ Erik asked, stopping in his stride.
‘No. The only people are in the village,’ Frost answered.
‘So they’re near the village.’ He would not acknowledge the possibility that they might not be alive.
‘Or in it,’ Frost added. Erik looked towards the village. In the snow, the houses seemed shrunken, like a giant child’s play-things left carelessly there.
‘Take the main street,’ he said and pointed in that direction. ‘Mindscan the villagers. See if they’ve seen anything. If you sense the children, contact me at once.’
‘And if I sense their mother,’ Frost added. Erik scowled; leaving things unsaid with telepaths did not work. Besides, that was a reunion he would not look forward to.
‘The children are our first priority,’ he said and turned away. Behind his back, he heard how Frost sighed and started trudging towards the village. Erik headed the other way. Frost could sort through the minds of the villagers. In the meantime, he could search the outskirts.
There were plenty of places to look, but few of them were places where anyone could survive even a day. Azazel had said that the villagers were used to the cold. Were these children? Did they know how to avoid it, or would they fall prey for it? Fearing that they would not be as lucky as he had been the previous week, he searched every visible dip in the ground and every hollow tree. He plunged his arms into the deep snow and feared every time that he would feel bodies under his hands. He never did, and he pressed on. He opened up abandoned barns and outhouses. None of them were warmer inside than out, but thankfully, they were all empty.
It took more than an hour before Erik found any sign. It was a small shed, where the snow had started to push in through the planks. The roof was badly maintained, and he could hear the wood holding it up creaking with the weight of the snow. The shed itself was empty but for a few barrels. Erik was about to leave - the roof was going to give way very soon, and he did not want to be under it when it did - but just as he was about to turn, one of the barrels caught his eye. The others were nailed shut, but not this one. Curious, he crossed to it and pushed away the lid. It was three-quarter full with dried winter apples. Erik peered behind it. Against the badly built wall was a small pile of apple cores.
He stood frozen to the spot, staring at these remnants of a meal. Above him, the wood creaked. He shook himself and rushed out of the shed, his heart suddenly lighter in his chest. This must be them - they must be close by...
Pushed on by this realisation, he looked around. Think, you fool, he said to himself. What would you do? He had been a child once - scared, frozen and hunted. Where would he have hid? The answer was evident. The perfect hiding-place was anywhere where others would not think of going. But where would people not go where someone could still survive in weather such as this? He looked around, hoping for a clue, when it suddenly caught his eye.
‘No,’ he murmured to himself. ‘They can’t have...’
In the distance, there was a well. In this cold, the water would be frozen. No-one would go there for their water. He started walking - he quickened his step - he broke into a run. Just a few yards from his goal, there was a patch of ice. He almost lost his balance and skidded the last short distance. Grabbing at the well’s side, he steadied himself. Now he could see that the lid was only half-closed. In the gap between the wooden lid and the stone side, he could see a light, an eery blue which looked neither natural or electric. With little effort, Erik pushed aside the lid and looked down.
The well was deep, but when he leaned over the opening, he could see the source of the blue light. Far down, huddled together in the narrow space, sat two shapes. They were wrapped in blankets, but from what he could see from their faces, he could tell that one was a girl and one a boy. The girl’s hands were cupped, and in them burned a small, blue fire. The boy held his hands up against it, rubbing warmth into it, but he had stopped mid-motion at the sight of the intruder. Even at this distance, Erik was very aware of how much the boy looked like him, with the same pale eyes and narrow face. The girl, however, was unmistakably Magda’s daughter, full-lipped and dark-eyed. He breathed out in relief. They were alive, and they were here. No harm would come to them.
But as he looked down at them, he saw their eyes change with fear. The girl frowned up at him and shouted a command. The fire she was holding rushed suddenly out of her hands. Erik threw himself back, and only narrowly avoided it.
‘I’m a friend! I want to help!’ he called in every language he knew. When he looked down into the well, he could tell that they had not understood his words, but his tone of voice must have conveyed his message - the girl did not try to fling any more witch-fire at him. It was easy to manipulate gravity within the enclosed space of the well to lift them up. The children clung to each other as they rose. They landed lightly in the snow, and Erik helped them to their feet. It was obvious now that they were weak, the boy more than the girl. With some difficulty, he lifted him up on his back; the child wrapped his arms around his neck to keep himself steady. Erik looped one arm around his leg to keep him up. The other he wrapped around the girl to shield her from view. As they started walking, the girl said something to him - a question, he thought - but he did not understand it.
They slowly moved towards the dacha. In their dark coats and blankets, they stood out in the snowy landscape. They were conspicuous enough that if someone saw them, they would guess that something was wrong. Therefore, Erik hurried on. The boy on his back seemed half-asleep. The girl at his side stumbled along, trying to keep up.
‘Come on, come on,’ he muttered, pushing her along. The dacha was ahead of them. Mystique, wearing her human face, appeared by the door and caught sight of him.
‘Erik!’ she called and rushed towards him, as quickly as she could in the snow. As she approached, he saw how she watched the children in confusion. Before she had time to ask, he pushed the girl towards her.
‘Take her inside,’ he said, giving her a look communicating that he would explain soon. She nodded and put an arm around her shoulders. She steered her towards the door, and Erik followed with the brother. ‘Is Azazel back yet?’ he asked as she prized open the door. She shook her head and stepped inside, pushing the girl in front of her. The sister took in her surroundings as Erik followed, letting down the boy. The door closed behind them.
The girl turned suddenly and called out something - a command, or perhaps a spell.
‘Mystique, watch out!’ Erik shouted. From the girl’s hands had sprung a ball of energy, which she flung against the people she thought were her captors. Mystique ducked, and the orb struck the door. The smell of scorched wood rose from the point of impact. Erik did not register that the boy had moved, but then suddenly he was at his sister’s side, going from a blur to a solid figure in the blink of an eye. Another ball of energy was forming in the girl’s palm.
‘I want to help you,’ Erik said imploringly, turning his palms towards them in a show of peace. The rage in her face did not change, and the orb grew. She raised her hands, about to fling it their way. Erik prepared to make a shield to deflect it, but before he had time, Mystique stepped up suddenly. Her hair reddened and her face changed. Her humanity drained away, and what remained was all mutant. The orb went out between the girl’s hands. The drive to protect herself and her twin seemed to have been all that had kept her on her feet. Now her rage dwindled, and she seemed to shrink with it. Her brother said something, and at once they enfolded each other in an embrace.
Mystique looked at Erik.
‘Mutant children?’ He nodded.
‘Charles was looking for them,’ he said and stepped up. ‘And so are the Red Army, if Frost is right. Mystique, start heating water for a bath.’ As she headed towards the kitchen, Erik coaxed the children into his room. There were some embers in the fireplace, and building up a fire did not take long. By now, he had realised that he was not able to communicate with them, and he suspected that they did not even speak Russian. Probably they only spoke Romani, but he only knew a few phrases in that, and none of them were useful in speaking to children. His children, he reminded himself. As he took their coats and shoes from them and put them close to the fire to dry, he felt a sudden relief at their inability to communicate. It means that he did not have to explain. Equally, he could not ask them of their mother. Without a word he left them at the fire and sent Mystique to make them take off their tattered clothes and dry them, while he filled the bath-tub.
It was almost full when he heard someone call from outside. Letting the bucket he had used for the water clatter to the floor, he entered the hallway. There, waiting for him, stood Azazel, looking drained.
‘Well?’ he asked. He wanted to ask, how is he? where did you take him? did he survive the journey? but he could not articulate any of those questions. Azazel had been in the service of others long enough to know how to deal with vague commands.
‘I took him to Hannover. One jump, as you said.’ In any other situation, Erik would have been impressed. That was longer than he had known Azazel was capable of teleporting.
‘And?’
‘I left him in a hospital. They must have found him at once when I left. I wasn’t seen.’
‘And how was he?’ Azazel shrugged, as if he did not really care.
‘Alive.’ It was all the answer he could hope for, he knew.
‘As good as it can be, under the circumstances,’ he said. ‘Rest. I have another task for you soon.’ Azazel stalked off, swinging his tail after him like an annoyed cat. Erik went the other way to where Mystique sat with the children. She was seated between them, while both twins watched them in rapt attention. Every second, she shape-shifted, so that her body constantly changed shape and colour. Watching them be so fascinated by her abilities made Erik oddly jealous. It had been through her mutant appearance their good intentions had been shown, not by a show of his power. He wished he had time to show it to them, and learn about their gifts. He knew that there was no way that could work.
Strengthened by the impossibility of his wish, he stepped in.
‘Mystique.’ She went blue again and looked over her shoulder at him. ‘The bath’s ready.’ She nodded and showed for the children to come with her. Obediently, they trotted after her, both dressed in what Erik thought was Angel’s jumpers. Just as he lost sight of them, he heard the door.
‘Magneto!’ He entered the hallway again and saw Frost, annoyedly beating the snow off her coat. ‘You could have told me you’d found them.’
‘I assumed you knew,’ he said and forced a malicious grin. It did not feel convincing. Frost glanced upwards and shrugged. As she started putting her coat on a hanger, he explained: ‘We don’t have any shared languages. We can’t communicate.’ She cocked a well-shaped eyebrow at him. ‘Except you, of course,’ he added. Yet another reason why he wished Charles was at his side, he thought to himself.
‘So I can answer all your questions for you,’ she added. ‘Their mother is dead.’ Frost’s disregard for tact did not make the blow harder. Somehow, he had already known. When she had not been with them, he had drawn his own conclusions. It made him more numb than grief-stricken. He had grieved for her when she had left him; as so much in his life, she had seemed to die as she grew more distant in time.
‘How long since?’ She shrugged.
‘They were young. Five, perhaps. The memories are vague.’
Erik looked for something to say to that, but before he had time, a sudden pain shot through his head. He winced and grabbed his forehead. It took a few seconds to will it away. Frost watching him the whole time, looking almost bored, as though she had expected it.
‘What are their names?’
‘You didn’t ask them that?’ she asked, looking unimpressed. ‘It’s not a difficult mime, is it? After all this time of Riptide communicating just with gestures...’
‘Just answer me, Emma.’ She rolled her eyes at his demanding tone.
‘Wanda and Pietro Maximoff.’ He nodded and started going towards his room.
‘Tell someone to prepare some food for them, and to pack provisions,’ he told her over his shoulder, ‘and ask Riptide to try to explain that they’re going on a journey. Don’t enter their minds unless there’s no other way.’ Frost was not as gentle as Charles, and Erik thought that Riptide would be able to make a good enough charade to explain such a message. Before she had time to object, he closed the door, at least a symbolic way of keeping the world out. He considered putting on his helmet, but the metal was so cold that he did not dare. Instead, he sat down bare-headed at the small writing-desk and found some string and a few sheets of notepaper left by the owners. On the first sheet, he wrote a short message:
Charles risked his life to save these two children.
Please take care of them. Charles is in hospital in
Hannover, West Germany.
M
He folded the sheet and put it in an envelope. As he sealed it, another bolt of pain shot through his head. He put down the envelope and waited for the sensation to subside. It took longer than last time, but finally it was gone. Taking two sheets of notepaper, Erik folded them both in half and made a hole in one of the corners, through which he tied the string. On one tag, he wrote Wanda Maximoff, on the other, Pietro Maximoff. He put no other description, not even their year of birth. He wanted nothing to identify his children other than their names.
He lingered at the desk, listening to the bustle in other parts of the house. He should rise and make sure that Azazel left with the children. The longer they stayed, the greater the risk that they would be found. There was no guarantee that no-one had seen them, or for that matter that the soldiers had some way of tracking them. For all he knew, they might have a telepath. But then again, Azazel had looked exhausted, and he could not risk losing him. He was after all their transportation. But there was still the question of the safety of his children, which were soon to become Charles’ children, if he lived. Charles might be dead at this moment and I wouldn’t know...
Erik got to his feet quickly. He needed to flee from these thoughts. Better to act now, and keep that possibility from his mind a little longer. He had accepted the news that Magda was long-since dead with a numbed calm, but the mere thought of Charles’ life being in danger made him want to tear the world apart. The helplessness made him feel like a child again, with no power over the destiny of those he loved. Perhaps he could leave his worry at the desk. Bringing the letter and the tags with him, he went to retrieved the twins’ clothes, and then headed upstairs. Halfway up the stairs, the pain struck again. It made him stop and stand very still, grabbing the banister to keep himself from falling. It felt like the headaches he had had before, but now it was worse. Perhaps it was just agitation, or perhaps Charles had ruptured something in his mind when removing the memories.
‘Erik?’ Mystique was at the top of the stairs, looking at him worriedly. ‘Is something the matter?’
‘No,’ he said, trying to ignore the pain. When he climbed the rest of the stairs, the ascent took more effort than it should have. ‘How are they?’
‘In the bath,’ she said and jerked her head and gestured down towards the kitchen. ‘Both of them. They don’t seem to want to let go of each other.’
Erik could understand that. After being driven from their home, the prospect of losing each other seemed all the more threatening. Instead of saying anything about this, he handed her the clothes.
‘Tell them to dress, and have them eat something.’
‘Sure,’ she said and gave him a nod. Just as they passed each other, she gave him a smile which was half-sorrowful and half-encouraging. He could not find it in himself to answer it. Instead, he headed towards Azazel’s door and knocked on it. There was a grumble from inside.
‘Get ready, and go downstairs,’ he called through the door. Without waiting for him to respond, he turned back to the stairs. Just as he was about to step down onto the first step, the pain struck anew, now so vicious that it almost made his knees buckle. He held himself upright against the banister, aware of the stairs ahead of him and what might happen if he lost his balance. When the pain subsided enough for him to open his eyes again, the first thing he saw was so vividly white that at first he had trouble making it out. Then his vision shifted into focus, and he saw Frost’s knowing eyes on him.
‘What’s wrong with me?’ he asked without letting go of the banister.
‘It’s all Xavier’s fault,’ she said casually.
‘How...? Did he... damage me?’ Frost smiled, as if she found it entertaining.
‘In a manner of speaking. Your mind is trying to reach memories that are no longer there. They’re not even blocked - there is a blank there. Your conscious knows more or less what was taken, but it is not there, and as you cannot remember losing it, it was never there. The struggle is what is causing you pain.’ Erik took a steadying breath.
‘But it’ll subside?’
‘I hope so,’ she said, not looking really as if she cared either way. ‘A contest for the leadership of the Brotherhood would be so tedious.’
Before he had time to ask her what she meant by that, a door behind them opened and Azazel stepped out. Deciding to cut his unwilling tête-à-tête with Frost short, he nodded to the teleporter.
‘Come with me, both of you.’
They went downstairs, Erik doing his best not to give away how unsteady he felt. The rest of the Brotherhood were gathered in the kitchen. Riptide was busy gesturing at the children, who were nodding as they munched on a piece of bread each. When Erik stepped in, he stopped his silent communication and stood to attention. After feeling disempowered for so long, sensing that he was feared was gratifying. However, he had wished that his children had not been among those who feared them.
It was Angel who broke the silence.
‘So, these kids...’
‘They’re mutants,’ Erik explained and crossed to them. The children watched him guardedly, but they did not flinch away when he tied the tags with their names to their coats. He showed the envelope to them and then put it in Wanda’s front pocket. Briefly, he kept his hand on it. When he returned it, she put her hand on the pocket and said something. Even if he did not understand, he was sure that it was a promise to keep the letter safe. He smiled at her and rose.
‘Azazel, you need to take these children to Westchester, New York, to Xavier’s mansion.’
Azazel stared at him as if he had told him to teleport them to the moon.
‘But Magneto...’
‘Do it in stages,’ he told him. ‘There are provisions for you. But do it as quickly as is possible. People will be looking for them.’ Azazel, knowing that he could not argue, merely sighed.
‘When?’
Erik turned his gaze from the teleporter to the children.
‘Now.’
He heard how Azazel muttered under his breath and gathered the provisions that the others had prepared. Still he did not look away from the children. How to say goodbye? There were no words which would work. But there was no time to hesitate. Erik leaned down and planted a kiss on Wanda’s brow, then one on Pietro’s. As he drew away, the children watched him, Wanda wonderingly and Pietro untrustingly. Azazel stepped up and offered them his hands. My children, Erik thought. Will I see them again...? They took hold around his fingers, and he pulled them to their feet. Will someone take care of them? Pietro looked at him with eyes the same pale blue as his. He opened his mouth to speak, and then, in a flurry of red smoke, they were gone.
Erik wanted to protest and call them back. What had he been about to say - perhaps they had been able to understand each other, by some miracle... The pain was back, and made him sway. Mystique grabbed his arm to steady him, but when she spoke, he could not hear her words. The pain was beating against his ear-drums, deafening him. It was offering oblivion. What a welcome state! He let go of the sorrow and the worry and finally his consciousness.
Next chapter
Fandom X-Men First Class
Pairings Charles/Erik, past Erik/Magda
Beta speak_me_fair
World count of chapter 5581
Word count of entire fic 20 896
Rating/warnings PG.
Disclaimer Marvels owns it, not I.
Summary With no recollection of why he has ordered the Brotherhood to go deep into Russia during the winter months, Magneto is considered insane by his followers, but the unexplained presence of Charles Xavier leads Erik to think that there is something more than mad to his amnesia and to the haunting but impossible memory of a kiss in the snow...
Summary My contribution to the xmenreversebang. Artist was cmajalis, with art prompt 1066.
Erik stared at Frost, wondering if he had heard her right. The words did not seem to make sense to him. How could his mind have been taken away from him?
‘I don’t understand,’ he said finally. Frost laughed, delighted.
‘How can you be so slow? So stupid? He’s been manipulating you.’
‘No,’ he said under his breath. ‘Charles wouldn’t do that.’
‘Oh, yes, he would. You know that,’ she snorted. ‘He’s not some kind of saint. He entered your mind and he cut a chunk out of it. That’s where the headaches comes from.’
For the first time since she entered his room, Erik felt he dared to turn her his back. He made his way to the armchair, not even minding that it showed that what she was saying was making him feel unsteady. Frost did not seem to mind; instead, she just continued speaking, as she leaned against a set of drawers.
‘What confuses me is that you must have been stupid enough to take off your helmet in his presence,’ she said. ‘Probably it wasn’t very long either. He did a sloppy job. That false memory makes it screamingly obvious what he’s done.’
‘A false memory?’ Erik repeated. ‘The walk in the snow?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I guess it’s a little daydream of his that he decided to use, and you wanted it to be true badly enough that you accepted it as a real memory.’
‘But it doesn’t make sense,’ Erik concluded. I should have known - it was obvious. Why did I never think that it might be his doing?
‘It was just your wish for it to be real that blinded you.’
‘But why would he do that? What did he take?’ The idea made him feel cold inside. He had trusted Charles - he had even wanted him to reach into his mind, as that in itself would have been a sign that he could communicate - but instead he had cut into his thoughts and taken his memories. For all he knew, there were things which had happened in his life that he could no longer remember. ‘How far back did he go?’
‘Only the past weeks,’ Frost said. ‘You can remember Paris, can’t you?’
‘Vaguely.’
‘But not deciding to come here,’ she surmised. Erik shook his head. ‘I suspected that something was wrong as soon as you made the decision. In the middle of the night, waking everyone with your raving... It seemed like someone had interfered somehow. I think, though, that he simply communicated with you. You weren’t being controlled.’
‘What did he take?’ Erik asked. ‘Why are we here?’
‘I have no idea,’ she admitted. ‘The memories are gone, Magneto. The only one who knows might be dying for all we know.’ Erik sighed.
‘Then perhaps we should leave,’ he said. ‘There is no reason to linger here, if we don’t know what we are doing here.’ Frost scoffed.
‘It is not like you to give up,’ she said and approached. She stopped right in front of him, looking down at him with kohled eyes. ‘Besides, you know enough to figure it out.’
‘I don’t,’ he said. ‘I know nothing.’ Frost threw up her hands in exasperation.
‘He spoke to you, didn’t he?’
‘Yes...’
‘What did he say?’ Erik thought about it.
‘He spoke about children,’ he said. ‘He told me to find the children, before the others did.’ He thought about it for a moment, and then shook his head. ‘He was probably being delirious. His fever...’
‘No, he was making sense,’ Frost said, obviously sure of it. ‘Let me give you another piece of the puzzle. That village doctor you brought was suspicious of us, and he wondered whether we were the ones the soldiers were looking for.’ Erik looked up in surprise.
‘The soldiers?’ He thought about the village, with its empty streets and twitching curtains. He thought about the gypsy camp, deserted and burned. He thought of what Charles had said - “you must find them, before the others do.” ‘That was what Charles meant...’
‘And the reason why we’re here,’ Frost said.
‘For the children?’ Erik repeated. ‘What children?’ But even as he said it, he realised that they must have been children of the gypsies. ‘What would the army want with them?’ Frost sighed and sat down on the bed.
‘What do you know about that helmet of yours?’ she asked.
‘It was Shaw’s...’
‘Where did he get it from?’
‘I always assumed that he constructed it.’ Frost shook her head slowly, her smile bordering on condescending.
‘It was a gift,’ she explained, ‘from the Russians, to keep Xavier out of his head.’ Erik frowned.
‘The Russians have the technology to do that?’
‘Obviously they do,’ she said. ‘They also have the knowledge of telepaths to do it. The CIA took an interest in mutants. Is it really surprising if the KGB doesn’t also?’ Erik thought about it, and sighed.
‘No, it’s not.’ Briefly, he thought about Schmidt, and wondered to what end the SS would have wanted to use his mutant powers. Then he returned to the matter at hand, unwilling to dwell on the past. ‘So there were some mutant children among the gypsies. The state wanted them, for whatever reason. They destroyed the camp and drove everyone away...’ But the villagers seemed afraid that they would be back. ‘But they did not find the children.’ It was not impossible that someone in the village was hoarding them or at least helping them, but he thought it implausible. How the children would survive on their own in this cold, however, was difficult to imagine. ‘Are they still searching?’
‘From what I gathered from the doctor’s mind, yes,’ Frost said. Then she pointed out: ‘You’re still missing something.’
‘Why don’t you just tell me?’ Erik snapped. ‘I don’t want to play this game.’
‘It wouldn’t be as fun. What did Xavier say about the children?’ Erik strained his memory. He had thought at first that he had meant his own students, but he had refuted it.
‘“Not mine”,’ he said. ‘That was what he said.’ Frost watched him, evidently interested to see if he understood it. ‘I don’t understand. What of it?’ She smirked.
‘Your love is blinding you,’ she said. ‘Even after all this time, you’re so infatuated with your telepath friend that you don’t want to think of other loves.’ She edged closer and looked him in the eye. ‘“Not mine”, he said. What’s the opposite?’ He stared back at her defiantly. There was no direct opposite. His, hers, theirs...
‘Yours,’ he said. Saying it made him feel oddly numb, while his heart suddenly beat harder. It could not be, it must not be... ‘Magda.’
‘How many years ago were you with her, Magneto?’ she asked. ‘Thirteen? So the children would be old enough to have their powers...’
‘Children!’ he exclaimed. ‘That makes no sense - we were not together for that long....’
‘But enough for her to become pregnant,’ Frost said. ‘What is to say that she did not have twins?’ He shook his head. It could not be... ‘Think about it, Magneto! Why would Xavier call you? Surely not to run his errands for him - not just because he wanted an excuse to see you? He had found something that was so close to you that he felt he needed to tell you.’
Erik turned away. He wished Frost would leave him to his thoughts.
‘But why would he make me forget?’
‘Why were you both unconscious in that clearing?’ Frost retorted. ‘Perhaps you were attacked. Maybe he was worried that you would not keep your peace... or that you would put yourself in danger.’ She shifted a little and then admitted: ‘I don’t think he did it out of spite. He had a reason. From what I’ve gathered, he is one for high morals.’
Erik got up. It was all too much to take in. But no, he could not let it overwhelm him. If it did, it would paralyse him completely.
‘The children must be somewhere in the area,’ he said, looking out of the window. They must be hungry and cold, if they were still alive. ‘We must find them.’
Frost rolled her eyes.
‘Most likely, they’re already dead,’ she pointed out. ‘In this kind of cold, you can freeze to death within hours. They must have been outside for a week. Even if they’re hiding inside...’
‘We’re going to find them,’ Erik said through gritted teeth. He knew that Frost might be right, but it did not change anything. The thought of the small bodies of children left outside to become the prey of animals awoke an anger in him which he thought he had lost during this past week. His mother and his father - his entire family - had been left in unmarked graves. He would not want the same for his children.
Without a word, he left the room and headed towards his own. Frost followed him. He decided to ignore her, and instead started putting on his furs.
‘And if we find them alive, what do we do with them?’ she asked.
‘They’re mutants. Their place is with their own kind.’
‘The Brotherhood is no place for children, Magneto.’
Erik paused. In that respect she was right. Finally, he answered:
‘We send them to Charles’ school.’ He just hoped that Charles would live to take care of them.
***
When they stepped outside, it had finally stopped snowing. The snow still lay high, reaching over Erik’s knees. He had sent Riptide and Mystique in one direction and had taken Frost with him in the other. Behind him, she was muttering at how her trousers were being ruined by the wet. In any other circumstances, that would have put him in a better mood. Now, it was simply dead noise which disturbed the silence. He needed her telepathy, but he was not happy about having to bring her with him. He wished he could be alone now and think through what he had learned without having a telepath close by. The realisation that he was a father had left him numb. It felt like a crude joke. What he had shared with Magda felt like it could not lead to such a thing. It had been passionate but brief, and before he had introduced the question of marriage he had shown her his power and she had turned away in horror. He knew that in reality, all it had taken was a moment, and that was a moment they had indeed shared. It was only about genetic tissue - he had given them no paternal protection or parental love. He was their sire, not their father.
‘Can you sense anything?’ Erik asked, stopping in his stride.
‘No. The only people are in the village,’ Frost answered.
‘So they’re near the village.’ He would not acknowledge the possibility that they might not be alive.
‘Or in it,’ Frost added. Erik looked towards the village. In the snow, the houses seemed shrunken, like a giant child’s play-things left carelessly there.
‘Take the main street,’ he said and pointed in that direction. ‘Mindscan the villagers. See if they’ve seen anything. If you sense the children, contact me at once.’
‘And if I sense their mother,’ Frost added. Erik scowled; leaving things unsaid with telepaths did not work. Besides, that was a reunion he would not look forward to.
‘The children are our first priority,’ he said and turned away. Behind his back, he heard how Frost sighed and started trudging towards the village. Erik headed the other way. Frost could sort through the minds of the villagers. In the meantime, he could search the outskirts.
There were plenty of places to look, but few of them were places where anyone could survive even a day. Azazel had said that the villagers were used to the cold. Were these children? Did they know how to avoid it, or would they fall prey for it? Fearing that they would not be as lucky as he had been the previous week, he searched every visible dip in the ground and every hollow tree. He plunged his arms into the deep snow and feared every time that he would feel bodies under his hands. He never did, and he pressed on. He opened up abandoned barns and outhouses. None of them were warmer inside than out, but thankfully, they were all empty.
It took more than an hour before Erik found any sign. It was a small shed, where the snow had started to push in through the planks. The roof was badly maintained, and he could hear the wood holding it up creaking with the weight of the snow. The shed itself was empty but for a few barrels. Erik was about to leave - the roof was going to give way very soon, and he did not want to be under it when it did - but just as he was about to turn, one of the barrels caught his eye. The others were nailed shut, but not this one. Curious, he crossed to it and pushed away the lid. It was three-quarter full with dried winter apples. Erik peered behind it. Against the badly built wall was a small pile of apple cores.
He stood frozen to the spot, staring at these remnants of a meal. Above him, the wood creaked. He shook himself and rushed out of the shed, his heart suddenly lighter in his chest. This must be them - they must be close by...
Pushed on by this realisation, he looked around. Think, you fool, he said to himself. What would you do? He had been a child once - scared, frozen and hunted. Where would he have hid? The answer was evident. The perfect hiding-place was anywhere where others would not think of going. But where would people not go where someone could still survive in weather such as this? He looked around, hoping for a clue, when it suddenly caught his eye.
‘No,’ he murmured to himself. ‘They can’t have...’
In the distance, there was a well. In this cold, the water would be frozen. No-one would go there for their water. He started walking - he quickened his step - he broke into a run. Just a few yards from his goal, there was a patch of ice. He almost lost his balance and skidded the last short distance. Grabbing at the well’s side, he steadied himself. Now he could see that the lid was only half-closed. In the gap between the wooden lid and the stone side, he could see a light, an eery blue which looked neither natural or electric. With little effort, Erik pushed aside the lid and looked down.
The well was deep, but when he leaned over the opening, he could see the source of the blue light. Far down, huddled together in the narrow space, sat two shapes. They were wrapped in blankets, but from what he could see from their faces, he could tell that one was a girl and one a boy. The girl’s hands were cupped, and in them burned a small, blue fire. The boy held his hands up against it, rubbing warmth into it, but he had stopped mid-motion at the sight of the intruder. Even at this distance, Erik was very aware of how much the boy looked like him, with the same pale eyes and narrow face. The girl, however, was unmistakably Magda’s daughter, full-lipped and dark-eyed. He breathed out in relief. They were alive, and they were here. No harm would come to them.
But as he looked down at them, he saw their eyes change with fear. The girl frowned up at him and shouted a command. The fire she was holding rushed suddenly out of her hands. Erik threw himself back, and only narrowly avoided it.
‘I’m a friend! I want to help!’ he called in every language he knew. When he looked down into the well, he could tell that they had not understood his words, but his tone of voice must have conveyed his message - the girl did not try to fling any more witch-fire at him. It was easy to manipulate gravity within the enclosed space of the well to lift them up. The children clung to each other as they rose. They landed lightly in the snow, and Erik helped them to their feet. It was obvious now that they were weak, the boy more than the girl. With some difficulty, he lifted him up on his back; the child wrapped his arms around his neck to keep himself steady. Erik looped one arm around his leg to keep him up. The other he wrapped around the girl to shield her from view. As they started walking, the girl said something to him - a question, he thought - but he did not understand it.
They slowly moved towards the dacha. In their dark coats and blankets, they stood out in the snowy landscape. They were conspicuous enough that if someone saw them, they would guess that something was wrong. Therefore, Erik hurried on. The boy on his back seemed half-asleep. The girl at his side stumbled along, trying to keep up.
‘Come on, come on,’ he muttered, pushing her along. The dacha was ahead of them. Mystique, wearing her human face, appeared by the door and caught sight of him.
‘Erik!’ she called and rushed towards him, as quickly as she could in the snow. As she approached, he saw how she watched the children in confusion. Before she had time to ask, he pushed the girl towards her.
‘Take her inside,’ he said, giving her a look communicating that he would explain soon. She nodded and put an arm around her shoulders. She steered her towards the door, and Erik followed with the brother. ‘Is Azazel back yet?’ he asked as she prized open the door. She shook her head and stepped inside, pushing the girl in front of her. The sister took in her surroundings as Erik followed, letting down the boy. The door closed behind them.
The girl turned suddenly and called out something - a command, or perhaps a spell.
‘Mystique, watch out!’ Erik shouted. From the girl’s hands had sprung a ball of energy, which she flung against the people she thought were her captors. Mystique ducked, and the orb struck the door. The smell of scorched wood rose from the point of impact. Erik did not register that the boy had moved, but then suddenly he was at his sister’s side, going from a blur to a solid figure in the blink of an eye. Another ball of energy was forming in the girl’s palm.
‘I want to help you,’ Erik said imploringly, turning his palms towards them in a show of peace. The rage in her face did not change, and the orb grew. She raised her hands, about to fling it their way. Erik prepared to make a shield to deflect it, but before he had time, Mystique stepped up suddenly. Her hair reddened and her face changed. Her humanity drained away, and what remained was all mutant. The orb went out between the girl’s hands. The drive to protect herself and her twin seemed to have been all that had kept her on her feet. Now her rage dwindled, and she seemed to shrink with it. Her brother said something, and at once they enfolded each other in an embrace.
Mystique looked at Erik.
‘Mutant children?’ He nodded.
‘Charles was looking for them,’ he said and stepped up. ‘And so are the Red Army, if Frost is right. Mystique, start heating water for a bath.’ As she headed towards the kitchen, Erik coaxed the children into his room. There were some embers in the fireplace, and building up a fire did not take long. By now, he had realised that he was not able to communicate with them, and he suspected that they did not even speak Russian. Probably they only spoke Romani, but he only knew a few phrases in that, and none of them were useful in speaking to children. His children, he reminded himself. As he took their coats and shoes from them and put them close to the fire to dry, he felt a sudden relief at their inability to communicate. It means that he did not have to explain. Equally, he could not ask them of their mother. Without a word he left them at the fire and sent Mystique to make them take off their tattered clothes and dry them, while he filled the bath-tub.
It was almost full when he heard someone call from outside. Letting the bucket he had used for the water clatter to the floor, he entered the hallway. There, waiting for him, stood Azazel, looking drained.
‘Well?’ he asked. He wanted to ask, how is he? where did you take him? did he survive the journey? but he could not articulate any of those questions. Azazel had been in the service of others long enough to know how to deal with vague commands.
‘I took him to Hannover. One jump, as you said.’ In any other situation, Erik would have been impressed. That was longer than he had known Azazel was capable of teleporting.
‘And?’
‘I left him in a hospital. They must have found him at once when I left. I wasn’t seen.’
‘And how was he?’ Azazel shrugged, as if he did not really care.
‘Alive.’ It was all the answer he could hope for, he knew.
‘As good as it can be, under the circumstances,’ he said. ‘Rest. I have another task for you soon.’ Azazel stalked off, swinging his tail after him like an annoyed cat. Erik went the other way to where Mystique sat with the children. She was seated between them, while both twins watched them in rapt attention. Every second, she shape-shifted, so that her body constantly changed shape and colour. Watching them be so fascinated by her abilities made Erik oddly jealous. It had been through her mutant appearance their good intentions had been shown, not by a show of his power. He wished he had time to show it to them, and learn about their gifts. He knew that there was no way that could work.
Strengthened by the impossibility of his wish, he stepped in.
‘Mystique.’ She went blue again and looked over her shoulder at him. ‘The bath’s ready.’ She nodded and showed for the children to come with her. Obediently, they trotted after her, both dressed in what Erik thought was Angel’s jumpers. Just as he lost sight of them, he heard the door.
‘Magneto!’ He entered the hallway again and saw Frost, annoyedly beating the snow off her coat. ‘You could have told me you’d found them.’
‘I assumed you knew,’ he said and forced a malicious grin. It did not feel convincing. Frost glanced upwards and shrugged. As she started putting her coat on a hanger, he explained: ‘We don’t have any shared languages. We can’t communicate.’ She cocked a well-shaped eyebrow at him. ‘Except you, of course,’ he added. Yet another reason why he wished Charles was at his side, he thought to himself.
‘So I can answer all your questions for you,’ she added. ‘Their mother is dead.’ Frost’s disregard for tact did not make the blow harder. Somehow, he had already known. When she had not been with them, he had drawn his own conclusions. It made him more numb than grief-stricken. He had grieved for her when she had left him; as so much in his life, she had seemed to die as she grew more distant in time.
‘How long since?’ She shrugged.
‘They were young. Five, perhaps. The memories are vague.’
Erik looked for something to say to that, but before he had time, a sudden pain shot through his head. He winced and grabbed his forehead. It took a few seconds to will it away. Frost watching him the whole time, looking almost bored, as though she had expected it.
‘What are their names?’
‘You didn’t ask them that?’ she asked, looking unimpressed. ‘It’s not a difficult mime, is it? After all this time of Riptide communicating just with gestures...’
‘Just answer me, Emma.’ She rolled her eyes at his demanding tone.
‘Wanda and Pietro Maximoff.’ He nodded and started going towards his room.
‘Tell someone to prepare some food for them, and to pack provisions,’ he told her over his shoulder, ‘and ask Riptide to try to explain that they’re going on a journey. Don’t enter their minds unless there’s no other way.’ Frost was not as gentle as Charles, and Erik thought that Riptide would be able to make a good enough charade to explain such a message. Before she had time to object, he closed the door, at least a symbolic way of keeping the world out. He considered putting on his helmet, but the metal was so cold that he did not dare. Instead, he sat down bare-headed at the small writing-desk and found some string and a few sheets of notepaper left by the owners. On the first sheet, he wrote a short message:
Charles risked his life to save these two children.
Please take care of them. Charles is in hospital in
Hannover, West Germany.
M
He folded the sheet and put it in an envelope. As he sealed it, another bolt of pain shot through his head. He put down the envelope and waited for the sensation to subside. It took longer than last time, but finally it was gone. Taking two sheets of notepaper, Erik folded them both in half and made a hole in one of the corners, through which he tied the string. On one tag, he wrote Wanda Maximoff, on the other, Pietro Maximoff. He put no other description, not even their year of birth. He wanted nothing to identify his children other than their names.
He lingered at the desk, listening to the bustle in other parts of the house. He should rise and make sure that Azazel left with the children. The longer they stayed, the greater the risk that they would be found. There was no guarantee that no-one had seen them, or for that matter that the soldiers had some way of tracking them. For all he knew, they might have a telepath. But then again, Azazel had looked exhausted, and he could not risk losing him. He was after all their transportation. But there was still the question of the safety of his children, which were soon to become Charles’ children, if he lived. Charles might be dead at this moment and I wouldn’t know...
Erik got to his feet quickly. He needed to flee from these thoughts. Better to act now, and keep that possibility from his mind a little longer. He had accepted the news that Magda was long-since dead with a numbed calm, but the mere thought of Charles’ life being in danger made him want to tear the world apart. The helplessness made him feel like a child again, with no power over the destiny of those he loved. Perhaps he could leave his worry at the desk. Bringing the letter and the tags with him, he went to retrieved the twins’ clothes, and then headed upstairs. Halfway up the stairs, the pain struck again. It made him stop and stand very still, grabbing the banister to keep himself from falling. It felt like the headaches he had had before, but now it was worse. Perhaps it was just agitation, or perhaps Charles had ruptured something in his mind when removing the memories.
‘Erik?’ Mystique was at the top of the stairs, looking at him worriedly. ‘Is something the matter?’
‘No,’ he said, trying to ignore the pain. When he climbed the rest of the stairs, the ascent took more effort than it should have. ‘How are they?’
‘In the bath,’ she said and jerked her head and gestured down towards the kitchen. ‘Both of them. They don’t seem to want to let go of each other.’
Erik could understand that. After being driven from their home, the prospect of losing each other seemed all the more threatening. Instead of saying anything about this, he handed her the clothes.
‘Tell them to dress, and have them eat something.’
‘Sure,’ she said and gave him a nod. Just as they passed each other, she gave him a smile which was half-sorrowful and half-encouraging. He could not find it in himself to answer it. Instead, he headed towards Azazel’s door and knocked on it. There was a grumble from inside.
‘Get ready, and go downstairs,’ he called through the door. Without waiting for him to respond, he turned back to the stairs. Just as he was about to step down onto the first step, the pain struck anew, now so vicious that it almost made his knees buckle. He held himself upright against the banister, aware of the stairs ahead of him and what might happen if he lost his balance. When the pain subsided enough for him to open his eyes again, the first thing he saw was so vividly white that at first he had trouble making it out. Then his vision shifted into focus, and he saw Frost’s knowing eyes on him.
‘What’s wrong with me?’ he asked without letting go of the banister.
‘It’s all Xavier’s fault,’ she said casually.
‘How...? Did he... damage me?’ Frost smiled, as if she found it entertaining.
‘In a manner of speaking. Your mind is trying to reach memories that are no longer there. They’re not even blocked - there is a blank there. Your conscious knows more or less what was taken, but it is not there, and as you cannot remember losing it, it was never there. The struggle is what is causing you pain.’ Erik took a steadying breath.
‘But it’ll subside?’
‘I hope so,’ she said, not looking really as if she cared either way. ‘A contest for the leadership of the Brotherhood would be so tedious.’
Before he had time to ask her what she meant by that, a door behind them opened and Azazel stepped out. Deciding to cut his unwilling tête-à-tête with Frost short, he nodded to the teleporter.
‘Come with me, both of you.’
They went downstairs, Erik doing his best not to give away how unsteady he felt. The rest of the Brotherhood were gathered in the kitchen. Riptide was busy gesturing at the children, who were nodding as they munched on a piece of bread each. When Erik stepped in, he stopped his silent communication and stood to attention. After feeling disempowered for so long, sensing that he was feared was gratifying. However, he had wished that his children had not been among those who feared them.
It was Angel who broke the silence.
‘So, these kids...’
‘They’re mutants,’ Erik explained and crossed to them. The children watched him guardedly, but they did not flinch away when he tied the tags with their names to their coats. He showed the envelope to them and then put it in Wanda’s front pocket. Briefly, he kept his hand on it. When he returned it, she put her hand on the pocket and said something. Even if he did not understand, he was sure that it was a promise to keep the letter safe. He smiled at her and rose.
‘Azazel, you need to take these children to Westchester, New York, to Xavier’s mansion.’
Azazel stared at him as if he had told him to teleport them to the moon.
‘But Magneto...’
‘Do it in stages,’ he told him. ‘There are provisions for you. But do it as quickly as is possible. People will be looking for them.’ Azazel, knowing that he could not argue, merely sighed.
‘When?’
Erik turned his gaze from the teleporter to the children.
‘Now.’
He heard how Azazel muttered under his breath and gathered the provisions that the others had prepared. Still he did not look away from the children. How to say goodbye? There were no words which would work. But there was no time to hesitate. Erik leaned down and planted a kiss on Wanda’s brow, then one on Pietro’s. As he drew away, the children watched him, Wanda wonderingly and Pietro untrustingly. Azazel stepped up and offered them his hands. My children, Erik thought. Will I see them again...? They took hold around his fingers, and he pulled them to their feet. Will someone take care of them? Pietro looked at him with eyes the same pale blue as his. He opened his mouth to speak, and then, in a flurry of red smoke, they were gone.
Erik wanted to protest and call them back. What had he been about to say - perhaps they had been able to understand each other, by some miracle... The pain was back, and made him sway. Mystique grabbed his arm to steady him, but when she spoke, he could not hear her words. The pain was beating against his ear-drums, deafening him. It was offering oblivion. What a welcome state! He let go of the sorrow and the worry and finally his consciousness.
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